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Review: The Buttermilk Truck

22 Dec


Ever since I saw TheKitchyKitchen’s post about the Buttermilk Truck, I could not wait to come back to LA to taste the sought-after breakfast wonders served from a truck.

Gosh, it has been weeks and every day I have ogled over the bite size treats on the Buttermilk website.

The owner/founder, Gigi Pascual, graduated LMU with a BA in Business Administration and shortly after went to culinary school in NYC at The French Culinary Institute for Pastry Arts. After working in a few restaurants, she decided to open up this truck.

Food trucks are just everywhere these days. You can feast on your tacos from truck A, scarf down your cupcake from truck B, and indulge in your midnight burger from truck C. My brother raves about this organic ice cream truck in NYC, and my friend Natasha won’t shut her trap about the crème brûlée cart in San Francisco’s Mission district! I just found the Grilled Cheese Truck online, and wowza does that sound cheesy and comforting!

The Buttermilk truck twittered about coming to the San Fernando Valley on Tuesday December 22, so this was the day I planned to go get my buttermilk breakfast fix.

My brother and I drove 20 minutes to get to this truck. The weather was windy, very very windy. The darn wind was not so conducive to us waiting in line for 30 minutes and then having no place to sit but the parking lot curb to eat all the while having the wind blowing my hair, my sweater, my food, and my napkins all over the place.

Due to the extreme windy conditions, I was almost too overwhelmed to take nice pictures of all the food. I managed to snap a few, but if you really want to see some nice photos, check out the KitchyKitchen or the Buttermilk website.

I ordered the breakfast sandwich—a fried egg with chicken apple sausage sandwiched between two buttermilk biscuits. It was supposed to come with a cute little hashbrown pancake, but they ran out just before we ordered. Bummer.


This little b-fast sandwich looked pretty darn delish, but honestly, it needed to be salted and peppered, and even though the yolk was nice and runny, the sandwich altogether was pretty dang DRY.

My bro ordered French toast on Hawaiian bread—it came dusted with powdered sugar and garnished with a slice of strawberry. Pretty good. Nice and crunchy on the outside. Very sweet and very fried.

Then we shared the cake donut bites. These were definitely the winners of the morning. Could have been slightly more aesthetically pleasing, but I’m kind of a food snob, so sue me.

The sandwich, French toast, and cake donuts cost $8.50. Not too bad?

Well, it took 20 minutes to drive there, 30 minutes to wait in line, 10 minutes to eat, and 20 minutes to drive back home. Plus, we were kind of in the middle of nowhere, well, we were in the middle of a bunch of warehouses. That’s a lot of minutes for windy, mediocre breakfast from a truck.


Here is my suggestion: if the Buttermilk truck happens to be in your area, yah, hit that up. Otherwise, eh, just come over to my house and I can make you the breakfast of your dreams (my brother can vouch for that).

>Magnolia Bakery’s Peanut Butter Cookies, Veganized

4 Dec

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As a devout fan of Sex and the City, when I went to New York a few years ago, I signed myself up to go on the official Sex and the City tour of New York City. Yes, it was amazing, pretty much everything I could ask for.

A huge bus filled with crazy fans like myself. There were young women, grandmothers, sisters, best friends, even mom and kids, boyfriend and girlfriend, people visiting from all over the world.

We stopped at the Pleasure Chest where Charlotte bought her “rabbit,” we drank cosmopolitans at a speak easy, we stopped by Miranda’s gym, Samantha’s place in the meat-packing district, the church where Miranda and Steve get married, the restaurant where Carrie went to meet Aidan’s parents…

Two of my favorite stops were at 1. Carrie’s stoop…


and 2. Magnolia Bakery.

Oh, the famous Magnolia Bakery. This is where the cupcake craze all began (at least in my book). Man oh man oh man. I want to go back there soooo bad! Let’s go to NYC right now ok?

I must go back to this cute Greenwich Village bakery and try something other than their cupcakes! The quaint little store is just filled with glorious cakes and cookies and confections!

I made their peanut butter cookies for my house mates. I made them vegan. You do not need to make them vegan (just use real butter and a real egg). These peanut butter cookies are so good, and I ate so much batter it’s ridiculous.

Chewy and peanut buttery with little surprises of cranberries and chocolate= LOVE!


I actually put whole peanuts in these cookies as well…next time I think I may omit them…they kind of just fell out and were not what I was looking for…

Another NYC hot spot that I have been dreaming about is Serendipity. Let’s go get some $9 frozen hot chocolate, shall we?

Magnolia Bakery’s Peanut Butter Cookies, veganized
adapted from Smitten Kitchen

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup earth balance butter, softened
1 cup peanut butter at room temperature (smooth is what we used, but I am pretty sure they use chunky at the bakery)
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1 Ener-G egg replacer equivalent of an egg, at room temperature
1 tablespoon soymilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1/2 cup chocolate chips

For sprinkling: 1 tablespoon sugar, regular or superfine

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, combine the flour, the baking soda, the baking powder, and the salt. Set aside.

2. In a separate bowl, beat the earth balance butter and the peanut butter together until fluffy. Add the sugars and beat until smooth. Add the “egg” and mix well. Add the milk and the vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture and beat thoroughly. Stir in the cranberries and chocolate chips.

3. Place sprinkling sugar — the remaining tablespoon — on a plate. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls into the sugar, then onto ungreased cookie sheets (I lined my sheets with parchment paper), leaving several inches between for expansion. Using a fork, lightly indent with a crisss-cross pattern.


4. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes. Do not overbake. Cookies may appear to be underdone, but they are not.

>Dorm Food Gets Schooled

3 Sep

>Um…Amazing! Just read this!

>Slow Food Done Kinda Fast: Oakland’s "Eat Real" Food Festival

30 Aug

>“You don’t have to cook fancy or complicated masterpieces—just good food from fresh ingredients”

–Julia Child

Today I ate some of the best cheese I have ever tasted! Mozzarella curd, pulled to order, drizzled with Arbequina (a type of olive) olive oil, good quality salt, and torn basil leaves. I ate my little puddle of cheese alongside some fat slices of heirloom tomatoes!


I purchased this simple cheese puddle at Jon’s Street Eats, one of the many vendors set up at Oakland’s “Eat Real” festival. Jon was boiling the cheese in some sort of magical way (well it was probably very simple but it tasted magical!). Mozzarella tends to be a mild, almost bland cheese, but when paired with the right accoutrements, mmmm!

In addition to the freshly pulled mozzarella, my friend, Michelle, and I shared a grilled eggplant sandwich—grilled eggplant, ratatouille, shaved Parmesan in a grilled split top bun! Everything tasted heavenly—the bun was just the right amount of buttery and salty, the grilled eggplant slices complemented the ratatouille so well!



The Eat Real Festival is loaded with crowds of people cruising along the boardwalk, tasting street food from various vendors highlighting fresh summer fruits and veggies, multicultural snacks, handcrafted local beers, and ice cream sold from the back of a bicycle! In connection with the Slow Food Movement, Eat Real aims to put eaters in contact with the real people — the farmers, chefs, and producers — who make our food.

For dessert, Michelle and I shared a fruit salad—watermelon, cantaloupe, cactus fruit, mango, pineapple, cucumber, and jicama. We ate it the authentic way with chili powder, salt, and lemon juice! YUM. Perfectly refreshing on a nice summer day!


Check out these homemade s’mores!

The line for this paella was a heap of tomfoolery! Look at those HUMONGOUS stoves!

A truck devoted to chowder. Gotta love the Bay Area…

San Diego Detour—Chino Ranch

22 Aug

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Chino Ranch Farms. Located in the midst of one of San Diego’s most exclusive suburbs, Rancho Santa Fe. The Chinos run a quaint produce stand called the Vegetable Shop.

Chino Ranch gained national prominence when Alice Waters of Chez Panisse discovered the exceptional produce. She now has weekly shipments of Chino produce delivered to the Berkeley restaurant. Currently on the menu are Chino’s lima beans, which are literally HUGE and will probably change your notion of the frozen pasty lima beans you may be used to…

Wolfgang Puck also uses Chino Farms produce at his Spago Beverly Hills Restaurant: Chino Farms Heirloom Tomato Soup, Roasted Chino Farms Beet Layer Cake…

The Chinos practice sustainable growing practices—labor-intensive cultivation methods and extreme devotion to harvesting only the best tasting produce.


Both Laurel Miller from the Oakland Tribune and I agree on the exquisite: “Rows of sparkling clean lettuces — the Chinos grow 60 varieties — lie next to pristine microgreens and herbs; snowy, baby icicle radishes, purple kohlrabi, burdock root, baby cauliflower in purple and apricot-hued “citrus” varieties; cardoons, red and Thumbelina carrots; warty-looking, dusky blue, hard squash; freshly scrubbed Jerusalem artichokes; Brussels sprouts the size of marbles; and containers of fresh, shucked heirloom shelling beans of every imaginable pattern and hue.”


I tried some of their strawberry figs! The riper and squishier the better! And they really had a hint of strawberry flavor, too! I also tasted these big, fat figs that I believe are called king figs? Either way they were yummy!


My family bought some tiny little colorful tomatoes, which were just so cute and tasted divine! Big tomato flavor! Very fresh. We devoured the little basket in one sitting; it was like eating healthy jellybeans!


If you are in the San Diego area and are a fan of pretty views and fresh produce, it is worth it to swing by the modest Vegetable Shop at Chino Farms.

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